Cedar and Maple
by LadyArrin
Summary: Beth is a second year student at the Berklee College of Music in Boston and gets paired with a dark, quiet, fellow Southerner for a guinea pig project and they both end up getting more than they bargained for. Rated M for future content.
1. Chapter 1

Beth shrugged her guitar over her shoulder and turned for campus as her scuffed converse sneakers hit the pavement at equal intervals. It was damn cold already; late September in Boston had a chill when it wanted to. Today was supposed to be one of the special classes; she was a dual major at Berklee College of Music (Contemporary Writing/Production and Song Writing) and today they were working with a group of the master's program, specifically the Music in Performance candidates. This was a guinea-pig group as such a collaboration hadn't be done attempted in the history of the College. They were the test subjects. She checked her watch, picked up the pace and managed to slide into the only empty seat just before the clocked ticked its way into nine. Up at the front were two professors; one was the familiar face who was her own teacher and Beth tuned herself in as she unbundled herself as quietly as she could. Today found her in a casual gray chambray shirt that rolled up the sleeves with a small, military style collar and a deep v-neck. Some of the girls were still wearing shorts or skirts but compared to Georgia Boston was freezing; which is why she was also in skinny jeans, a black coat and a bright blue scarf. Then something her professor said caught her ear.

"For the rest of the year you will work with the person we pair you with. At the end of second term we expect a full, twelve-track album of your collaborative work. Any style, any genre, but you must write and perform every aspect of it yourself. You will not have any classes left for this course until the very last of the term, where you will hand in sixty copies of your CD with cover art to be sold as we see fit." The room had dropped into silence. "Doing the minimum will get you a C. If you sell copies on your own, or perform live, send us receipts and videos. The goal here is to learn to market yourselves. Master's candidates, you may consider this a source in your thesis. It has been cleared from the Dean." There was a quiet murmur from the left side of the room as the fifteen students going for a master's discussed this amongst themselves. They were the ones who had the least to gain with this project and there had been some dissent at the mention of this concept a few weeks ago. The professors seemed inclined to let them talk it out and Beth crossed one leg over the other as she looked at the mix of adults across the was a fairly even mix of men and women but there was one student who was sitting in the back corner and not getting involved in the talk of his peers. He seemed content to sit back and let them argue it out instead. He looked to be around late twenties with shaggy hair, bright blue eyes, and a black leather vest over an equally black t-shirt. She idly wondered what instrument he played. He didn't have one with him (that she could see) but that didn't necessarily mean anything. The group quieted and the professors at the front started to talk again. "Right then. We'll be listing pairs. Raise your hands so you can find each other and get to work, we'll see you at the end of the term." The list went on and on as people got up and left, and then... "Greene and Dixon!"

The man in the leather vest cocked his fingers up in the air before getting to his feet and locked eyes with her for a moment as he gathered his things and headed for the door. It took her a moment to get everything together and sling her guitar across her back before she could turn down towards the door where her new partner was waiting. On her way she noticed a glint in the corner where her partner had been sitting and she rerouted to go and find out what it was.

–

He would get stuck with the chippy little blonde girl. Daryl wasn't surprised she was nearly late. He was more surprised about the lack of a coffee cup in her hand since the phrase '15 minutes late with Starbucks' was at the forefront of his brain. He wasn't exactly against the collaborative initiative and he wasn't overly concerned about it either. He figured his classmates were making a whole big deal out of nothing, saying that the second years had no idea what they were doing. They'd gotten into Berklee which meant they had to be half-way decent; he just didn't want to be the only one doing the work. The tiny figure ambled over to him with a smile on her face and put out her hand, which he shook. It was her voice that surprised him. Less the voice than the accent. It was delicately southern and it reminded him of home with a sharp pang that ricocheted off the walls of his chest. Daryl forgot sometimes how much he missed Georgia until something pointed it out.

"Hey, I'm Greene. Beth Greene." Pale blonde hair, tiny with blue eyes that were forced to look up at him because he was towering over her.

"Daryl." He could see her face light up as she heard the twang in his own voice, softened by many, many years living as a yankee. Living far away smoothed his accent the way a river does a pebble. If she stayed here it would happen to her too.

"Where are you from, Daryl?" The handshake had been brief but strong and she turned towards the practice rooms. "C'mon, let's go sit down and talk." The rooms were empty this time of day and they managed to snag a particularly well equipped one, containing two lush-looking chairs and a piano. Daryl answered her a little reluctantly. "Georgia. Been here for a while, though. Noticed you got the twang yourself." The practice room was spacious enough for them to relax, roomy for one and comfortable for two. "What do you mostly play?" He watched, slightly amused, as the girl dumped both of her bags and the pile of excess clothing into the corner of the room and took her guitar out of the case. It was a beautiful piece but nothing special; he would have been amazed to find her with anything more than mid-range; you didn't get good stuff until you got...well, good. Daryl also watched her fingers pick at the strings of her guitar as she tuned it effortlessly by ear. If nothing else, that was a promising hint of what she could do. She had a delicate touch and it seemed as though her fingers were ghosting down across the strings and he was suddenly and violently assaulted by an image of what _else_ those fingers were capable of. _Down boy._

"Georgia myself." Of course, they would be from the same place, wouldn't they? "Daddy was a farmer but I've been in love with music since I could hear it, you know?" Beth's blue eyes were focused on the head of her guitar and not on him, giving him a chance to study her in depth for a moment or two. "He told me to give Berklee and Julliard a shot, Hopkins too. Deal was that if I could get in, he would pay for it. Julliard was in New York and I didn't really like it as much and Hopkins just didn't fit. Little too classical for me, really." Her fingertips had shifted from tuning to picking out a soft, idle sound. "It's different here, other side of the line and all. I do a little of everything, mostly guitar and piano." Daryl had to admit that even though she had only applied to three schools, they were some of the top conservatories in the country.

"You sing?" Daryl settled into the chair with his notebook and one ankle crossed over his knee as he started pressing pencil to paper in the beginning of a sketch. It was time to get an idea of where they stood in terms of skills. Beth gave him a glance; the first since she had sat down with her guitar. Had assumed that was a given about her? Usually singing and guitar went hand in hand.

"Yeah, I do. What about you?" She had always been quiet (some might argue mousey) but music was her calling and it filled her from the bottom of her soul. "I do a lot of country type stuff, surprise surprise, but sometimes I branch out and go a little more mainstream."

"About the same." Daryl's voice had a hint of a rasp to it but was pleasant to listen to. "Guitar, bass, singing. Decent 'nuff with a sax and I'm trying my hand at the cello." He mostly wrote a little of everything but the focus of his program was technically jazz. Going into Berklee he'd had only his guitar. But that was the beautiful thing about college; it broadened your abilities. He had proven a fairly quick learner and had rapidly expanded his repertoire. "Any idea of what you wanna do for this project?" He was surprised when her fingers went quiet and her head tilted a little. Daryl was alarmed to find his heart beat a little bit faster as a sly grin crossed her face as she held up his phone. "What? How the hell did you get that? Didn't nobody teach you to respect people's property?" The perky (pesky?) little blonde was scrolling through his phone. His music. And not only that, she picked the song, letting it play as she tossed it to him, ignoring his sound of indignation. He felt his fingers wrap around the solidity of his phone out of reflex. That would teach him to leave his phone without a passcode.

"Are you CRAZY, kid? You can't just throw shit around and expect people to catch it!" But then...he was distracted by what she had chosen. The Civil Wars, "To Whom It May Concern". Her fingers were somehow creating that damnably soft sound over the strings of the guitar, wrapping his head and soul in the fuzzy little chords that floated through the room. His ears and his brain made a connection with his heart and his lungs and he was singing because he knew the words by heart. Those fingers were wasted on a spruce guitar, he realized. They were meant for cedar; something soft and delicate that would amplify the quieter tones she seemed to favor. And then...he was lost in the music.

Singing with Beth was very nearly a transformative experience. Daryl's blue eyes were closed but if he had taken the time to open them he would have seen that her eyes were closed as well. She was playing by touch and feel and the subtle knowledge that only comes from years and years of practice. For her part Beth was terrified. She'd always had an innate ability to suppress the fear and sing and play with no hesitation and it was that which saved her now, from the first note to the last that lingered into silence. Both sets of blues locked onto each other at the same time; Beth's wide and anxious expression a sharp contrast to Daryl's hyper focus and intensity. Beth was caught. "I didn't take your phone, Daryl." She practically blurted it out before breaking their contact and dropping her eyes to stare at her sneakers. "You left it on your chair." Daryl's hand went immediately to his pocket. It must have fallen out when he stood up to leave the room. He reached out to brush fingers over her knee, to catch her attention again and ignored the urge to leave his hand resting on her knee. She was trying to ignore the tingling _zing _that had shot through her leg at his touch.

"Hey." Daryl's voice was quieter now and his hand was hovering above her knee. "Just give it to me next time, alright? I get a little weird about people touchin' my shit." Merle had had no respect of his boundaries and it made him paranoid as an adult. He'd never had a space where his brother wasn't and it had left him with a deep, fiercely burning anger and resentment for all that he loved his brother. His fingers dropped.

"Is that why you don't bring your guitar into class?" The touch of fingers against denim (and the damn tingle that came with them) brought her eyes back up to his. He nodded carefully as he settled back into the chair with her guitar, their positions reversed. Now he was the one strumming aimlessly as he tried to think of something that wasn't associated with Merle. A heavy silence feel between them and the difference between their musical styles became apparent. He preferred bold chords and and heavier sound.

"Part of it. It's a lot of theory at our level, a lot of writing. A little less practical. I live close 'nuff that I just leave my shit at home. Don't have to worry about booking a practice room, neither." Broad shoulders shrugged under leather as his fingers moved down the strings. "Roommate's never home; he's a cop. Neighbors don't seem to mind yet." He could see her swinging her sneakered feet under the piano bench; you can take the girl out of the country but you can't take the country out of the girl. "You could say my brother had issues with the concept of ownership. Ended up hiding the damn guitar behind my rifle case, under my bed."

She cocked her head at him as she tried not to smile. "Not something I ever thought I'd hear again in casual conversation. Guns, I mean." She had to clarify at the vaguely confused expression on his face. "People here have a different attitude towards them, you know? Daddy had a few but I never learned to shoot. Mom always said it would be when I 'got older' and I just stopped askin'. I never needed to know."

Daryl glanced at her briefly before putting his focus back on the way the strings were being plucked from under his fingers, the way the vibrations moved up his hand and the motion of his fingertips that felt deep in his bones as they moved from chord to chord. "I can teach you. It's something every self-respecting southern woman should know how to do. Rick brings me by the range all the time." He cleared his throat a little. "If you want. I figure we need to start spending some time together outside of music, get a feel for each other." His fingers missed the strings for the first time in years and the harsh, wrong-sounding note lashed out between them. "I didn't...I don't..." Daryl was flaming up to his ears. Jesus Christ! She was a _kid_. "I think this whole project'll work better if we're...friends." She was a practically a child...but Beth didn't sound like a kid or act like a kid. Maybe she was a little immature but she was a raised in a small town and she _was_ young; some of that just couldn't be helped. But man, would he like to get a feel of that. He realized he was staring at the spot of skin shown on her chest; not quite cleavage but low enough to supply his brain with the missing information. Daryl tore his eyes away and let his fingers pick the rhythm back up. "How old are you anyway?"

"Nineteen." A young nineteen at that, but she would leave that out of conversation for now considering how his fingers slipped and the guitar cut off short with a harsh jangle for the second time in the span of a few minutes. "Do I even wanna know how old you are?"

"Twenty-seven."

Well, shit. So much for that; as if any man of his caliber would ever be interested in a teenage girl like her. He was, however, also right. The closer they were the better their music would be. It was with that in mind that she chose to accept his invitation to the shooting range with his roommate. "Teach me." She paused and once again their positions were reversed. He was caught in those big blue eyes that were framed by thick lashes and pale honey-wheat tendrils that had escaped from the hold of the ponytail. "How to shoot, I mean. I'd like to know." Daryl cleared his throat again before speaking and breaking their stare.

"Sure. You free this weekend?"

"_Maggie!" Beth's shriek was cut off by a pillow as she buried her face in it. "C'mon, Mags. He's like...old. Daddy would _kill_ me." Her sister grinned at her from the end of the bed, lighting up the room with the screen. "Besides, we have to work together for a whole year."_

"_But he's cute, right?" Maggie was looking at her pixelated little sister over a cup of coffee and a bagel. "You really don't have much to lose. I'm not sayin' you should chase after him, mind. Not obviously. Not yet. That's the last thing you should do. Trust me on this. He's thinkin' about it even if he don't want you to know. You gotta be smooth. This is a long-range game, Beth. Just hang out. Get him to open up. Get yourself a solid workin' relationship and go from there. I think he might be good for you. Smart, musical, southern." She sighed as she heard a call from the porch. "Listen, Beth, I gotta go. Just go hang out with him. Don't get all spiffy. Cute but super casual, kay? Call me tonight if you want. Just go for it."_

"_Alright, Maggie. Love you." Beth touched the screen closed with a heavy sigh. She missed her sister. _

The next time Daryl saw Beth was outside of her dorm where he'd come to get her. She was dressed practically for the weather and the activity. Black skinny jeans and sturdy brown boots led up to a very over-sized sweatshirt with _East Coweta_ written across the chest in purple with a screen print of a profile of a Native American. She also worse floppy, ivory-colored knit hat that contained her mess of blonde hair and a bright purple scarf. Beth waved enthusiastically at him as she spied him from down the block and practically skipped towards him. Daryl grumpily thrust out a cup of coffee at her and looked at her from under his bangs. "See you're a morning person." It was bright and early at eight in the morning on a Saturday; Daryl was still hungover from the night before. At least he didn't smell like a bar anymore; he'd gotten first shower since he had to get the girl. Rick was in the water now and Daryl had started the coffee for him before he'd left. There was no such thing as too much coffee. Her chipper response was already grating on him; he'd only had one cup so far this morning which was far less than the three cups he usually required to be functional.

"I see you aren't. Maggie, my sister, still works on the farm with Daddy so we Skype before she needs to go do most of her chores." Beth missed Maggie with every fiber of her being. They were sisters; they bickered and warred with each other but Maggie had also gotten her through her first heart-break, her first hang-over, and the consequences the first time she ever snuck out and gotten caught. Maggie had gotten her drunk the first time so she knew what would make her sick and how much she could take. Maggie had held her hair as she thrown up and also given her her first pull of a joint. Maggie had taught her about sex and being smart about it, had given her a box of condoms to take to school. Maggie and Beth were a team, sisters, and friends, always and forever. Of course they'd talked about Daryl and Maggie had told her to "go for it" before hanging up. She took the cup with a brief touch of sadness before it vanished back into her chipper exterior . "So where exactly are we going?"

He hadn't missed the shadow across her face and it made him a little uncomfortable to think she might be hiding something. For some reason he didn't want her to be sad. Daryl scrubbed the back of his hand across his wet hair as he turned on his heel and pointed back the way he came. "Back to my apartment to pick up Rick and the truck. We're going to the bay, a place called Moon Island. S'where the range is." It was a little chilly to be walking around with wet hair and a t-shirt but somehow the man was comfortable in just that. A grey t-shirt and a flannel shirt under his vest, and a pair of jeans and a pair of boots. "Ain't far, a few blocks maybe." He caught a hint of a blush creeping up her face, which she tried to hide with small little sips of the dark caffeinated beverage in her hands. Daryl hid a twitch of a smile. He was making her uncomfortable. Good. Last night, during a very drunken heart-to-heart with Rick he'd gotten some shit sorted out.

_Rick and Daryl were drunk again and hanging out just the two of them. Rick had had a hard shift and really just needed to focus on somebody else's problems for a change and Daryl had been more than willing to oblige him. It had been weird; the two of them had been loners from the start, introduced by a mutual acquaintance. Rick had been trying to get over the death of his partner who had been shot in the line of duty and he needed a roommate to make rent. Daryl had been struggling out of his truck for two months just shy of his nineteenth birthday. They'd be living together for eight years and had eventually become friends. Rick's nightmares were bad enough to rival Daryl's. Their friendship had grown and Rick was the only person Daryl ever confided in. "It's rough, man. You'll see what I mean. She's cute, in a pixie kinda way. But she's a kid. She's still technically a teenager." He passed over the bottle of whiskey with a shrug and a headshake, raising his voice over the music in the background. "But God can she sing. I need to hear her on the right guitar. That piece of crap she's playin' ain't doin' her any favors."_

_His roommate took the bottle and shifted slightly on the armchair. "C'mon, Daryl. You like her. At a least a little bit. You practically smiled. She's also not that much of a kid. Old enough to be here, sure enough." Rick's face was covered in rough, dark stubble that caught the shadows as he took another few swigs from the bottle and passed it back._

_Daryl shrugged again. "I think I could. She's not really my type, but she's got..." He flicked his fingers in the air briefly. "Spark, I guess. Somethin'. Makes me wonder what she's hidin', what she's really like." _

"_Look." Rick waved the bottle, pointing at his friend with the bottom of it. Daryl took the opportunity to grab it for himself; they'd given up on glasses a long time ago. "If she got you this twisted up after a day you got a long year ahead of you. Just take it one day at a time. Friendzone her if you gotta but this your future. You need her."_

_It was a bitter pill to swallow. He did need her._

Beth took the stairs to the walk-up a second behind her guide and tried to ignore the little hitch in her breath. She clearly needed to start running again. A third floor walk-up shouldn't be giving her this kind of trouble. "RICK!" Daryl bellowed his friend's name and thumped loudly on the door to their apartment to give him time to get decent before he let himself and Beth in. Their apartment was a third floor, north facing, two bedroom place with a living room and a very small kitchen and what looked like an even smaller bathroom. It was mostly clean and organized with the exception of a stack of magazines on the coffee table and a few beer bottles along with an empty bottle of whiskey. The room itself had movie posters on the walls and windows that let in the sun right over a table and chairs. There was a dark brown couch and an armchair that didn't match. Then a man walked out of the bathroom. A tall, muscled, very naked man. Beth turned scarlet and whirled around, too shocked to even say a word. Daryl reached for one of the bottles and threw it at him with a snarl that didn't mask the _tocking_ sound the glass made as it bounced off the wall. "You did that on purpose you sonofabitch. Go put some fucking clothes on." Rick threw him a laugh before vanishing into his room. A brief moment of foresight had him digging through his phone to hit the silence button half a second before the buzz was felt against his leg.

_Well, we know she isn't gay._

"I'm...really sorry about him. He's not usually that naked. Or obnoxious." He clicked the screen to darkness as there was a muffled shout from the bedroom that sounded suspiciously like "it's my badge getting you in today!" Daryl rolled his eyes and sprawled out on the couch, coffee cup in hand, gesturing for the girl to have a seat. "Pick a place, Beth. We're at his mercy now. I still can't believe your pa didn't teach you to shoot."

Beth, for her part, had taken a seat on the very edge of the armchair with her elbows perched on her knees. Sitting fully back in the chair would have felt like an invasion; she wasn't that comfortable here. "Maggie promised to teach me to make up for it but it's just so busy when I go back. So much to do, y'know? Part of it is that I'm the youngest, I think . Dad was always pretty insistent on what he considered 'age appropriate' stuff." She rolled her eyes before the door cracked open and Rick was there in the door fully dressed. He crossed the room and held his hand out to the little blonde.

"I'm Rick. Nice to meet you. Beth, was it?" Her shake was firm and solid for coming from such a tiny hand. "C'mon, let's get going. The range might not be crowded, it's looking overcast." They weren't technically allowed in but the legacy of Shane Walsh, Rick's former partner, lived deep in the heart of the Boston police. Rick could do no wrong. He went for the door and Daryl was on his feet and following him out into the hall and held the door for Beth as she went by him. It was time to head to the range.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Thank you all so much for the positive reaction! Holy cow! This AN will be a little long, the future ones will be shorter. Now, if you've followed me at all for some time on FF or read my other work you'll realize two things. One, that I am terrible with series and two, that my work is often either dark or contains dark undertones in bits and pieces. There is some dark in this story, you'll find it when it becomes relevant. Anyway, My goal for this story is to have about a chapter a week, give or take, but in the interest of being honest I'm going to be out of the country for a week or so come the end of the month. Also. As cool as I am (kidding! Or am I?) I cannot for the life of me write music. Call it a quirk. From here on out any music you see these two 'write' (either separately or together) will be hijacked and I'll tell you exactly what song and who the artist is here in the A/N and maybe provide a link (if the work noted is 'complete' but feel free to look it up if you want as it does give you an idea of where I'm gonna go). Today's semi-finished song comes courtesy of a duo called The Civil Wars, titled "I've Got This Friend". I think these two are in for a hell of a trip. This chapter is a little bit laid back, little more fluff. Drama begins to kick in with chapter three. I do love reviews, they are wonderful motivators! ~ladyarrin**

The ride to the range was quiet and uncomfortable. Rick's truck was barely big enough to fit the three of them on the bench seat as they wound through the streets of Boston and down towards the water. Beth had ended up between Daryl and the door but wasn't sure what would have been worse; sitting where she was now with his arm barely over her shoulder and trying to keep some space between them or stuck between him and an equally (if differently) attractive man. Maggie was going to die laughing when Beth told her about this that was for sure. Stuck in a truck with a cop and a redneck musician...it sounded like the punchline to a very bad joke. Beth determinedly kept her eyes firmly ahead but she could feel the way her face was flaming up and burning deep into the tips of her ears. Daryl was radiating heat and the pressure of feeling his side and thigh pressed against hers was almost too much to bear. For his part Daryl was equally uncomfortable and stiff. He was well aware of how she should have fit against his side, filling a vacancy he hadn't really noticed existed before. He was struck by how easy it would be to just drape himself casually across her and to utterly envelop her in his space. Despite the large size of the sweatshirt the man could feel how delicate she really was. Beth's perfume was light, bright, and almost effervescent; something heavy would have weighed her down. Between that and her floral shampoo it was all Daryl could to do to restrain himself from actually leaning over and burying his face into the contained blonde locks.

That wasn't exactly an option because it would be damn creepy for starters. Daryl was a lot of things and was a man of many, many talents and qualities and while a lot of them were bad a lot of them were good too, and he was never the type of a man to force himself onto a woman. That was left to his father and his brother. He was guilty of occasionally get handsey with a girl (especially if he was drunk) and once when he was much younger he had even been slapped but Daryl liked to think he had a semblance of honor. He would never admit it either to himself or to others but he was a loner at heart and could count his encounters he'd had with the opposite sex in the five years on one hand. He had never found a woman he would want in his life. A woman would understand his upbringing and his reasoning, a woman who wouldn't kick him out of bed in the middle of the night because he kicked her when he thrashed with nightmares and cried out in his sleep. He had long since given up and remained resolute in the fact that he was going to be a bachelor forever. Eventually Rick would wise up and get married and have a whole parcel of kids underfoot, move to the suburbs, and he would be "Uncle Daryl" who taught them how to find the joy in fishing on a quiet river, the focus it took to track an animal, the peace you found sleeping in the trees at night. Things city kids would never understand unless they were showed how, a quiet mark on how he left the world. It was all he could ever hope to want in life. A steady income and a place to live that did not have his family. Things didn't always end up happy and pretty and tied with a neat little bow and Daryl had come to terms with the fact that that life wouldn't end pretty for him. He had a decent job working at Berklee, enough to pay the rent. The rest, tuition included, was supplied by the scholarship he had so laboriously acquired. His list of acquaintances was short and his list of friends was even shorter. He had Rick, he had guys from school he went out and had a beer with after class. Now, it seemed, he could add Beth onto his short list of friends.

Soon enough they were crossing the bridge and were out over the water just long enough for this to qualify as an 'island' and then were down into the police compound. Rick showed his badge, filled out the form on the clipboard handed through the window, and handed it back with Daryl and Beth's ID's. Rick had been right. It seemed as if the clouds that were rolling over the horizon had chased away a good portion of the unnecessary personnel. Between the ominous look the clouds seemed to carry and the early hours of the morning it seemed like a good formula for a empty, quiet range. Beth glanced over to the end of the open space to where Rick seemed to have separated himself from the two of them with ear protection already in place as he slid the magazine into the butt of his pistol. She was distracted by his stance, the way his feet were staggered with one forward and one back, shoulder width apart. She studied his shoulders and the slight curve of his elbow and found herself moving to copy him. Angles. It was all about angles in the end. Daryl wasn't sure if he should be impressed that she was so quick and eager to learn or affronted that she was essentially ignoring him to do so. There were a few things about her improvised stance that were a little bit off.

The petite blonde nearly jumped out of her skin when hands placed themselves lightly onto her hips and the sudden presence of Daryl was at her back. He'd been watching her watching Rick, watching as she had advertised her ignorance with what was effectively a neon sign. Crap. The sound of his voice near her ear nearly caused her to shiver; it ended with what was effectively an aborted twitch. His voice was low and quiet and played across the back of her neck before enveloping her in the familiar cadence of _home_.

"You need t'bring your feet just a little bit farther apart and stagger 'em." Beth felt a gentle pressure on the inside of her right foot, encouraging her to move it until it was in the correct position. "Your back is stiff, too. You're standin' like you got the weight of the world on your shoulders, blondie. Lighten up." The smugness in his voice was borderline annoying but somehow the only thing she could think of was how she had gradated from 'kid' to 'blondie'.

One of his palms came to rest flat against her back between shoulders and rub just along her spine through the fabric of her sweatshirt. "Looser you are less it'll affect your aim." What Daryl didn't seem to realize, though, was that his touch was having the opposite effect of 'relax'. Beth's shoulders were wound tight and the muscles under her skin felt ready to snap. All she could focus on was that pressure on her hip that hadn't let up, the hand on her back, and the realization of how long had it been since she had simply been _touched_ by another human being let alone touched romantically. The fingers trailing across her hip, even over her sweatshirt, were bold in a way she would never have tolerated in another man, causing a brief flare up of emotion that was equal parts anger, desire, and fear of being touched further. Beth had a sinking realization that all together it wasn't exactly a _bad _feeling. It was thrilling and she felt her heart race and felt, rather than heard, the trilling sound of it in her ears. God above she really needed to get out of her room more. Perhaps if she did she wouldn't be standing here without a clue of how to get her body to calm down. Beth rolled her shoulders and her neck and there was a sudden lack of something at her back. Daryl had stepped away and was pulling a case out from by his feet and putting it on the ledge. His time and care in taking out a revolver and a box of bullets was enough for her to regain her composure and step up next to him.

"It's easy enough, you saw Rick. Basically point'n shoot" He handed her a pair of earplugs. Down on the far side of the range Rick was already firing away with a rapid staccato of shots that were hitting center mass on his human-shaped target in steady, even groupings. "That's what you want. See how his elbow's cocked? Easier t'control the gun. But first things first." Daryl went through the motions of basic safety and education but eventually she was handling a live weapon on her own. "Called the Lady Ultra." It was a small, uneventful looking, snub-nosed revolver. Beth was so focused she didn't even realize that Rick had stopped and was watching her or even pause to wonder why Daryl had a gun that was clearly too small for him. It fit perfectly in her hands.

It was heavier than she had thought it would be for a such small gun and less fragile than she had anticipated, although why she would thin a gun was fragile was really beyond her at the moment. With the earplugs in it was easy to simply focus on the round paper target at the end of the range and line it up within her view. It was so far away. Beth almost found herself in doubt that anything shot from _here_ would really end up _there_. It was an abstract concept with nothing but theory behind it since she'd never shot a gun before or a bow or a even a slingshot. The trigger responded to a whisper of her finger and the recoil of the gun brought her arms up and back and just like that there was a hole on the edge of the target. Suddenly it wasn't theory anymore. It was alive and the way that the metal in her hands had jumped had sent fire racing through her veins. A predatory, wolfish smile crossed her face as baby blue's locked down onto the target at the end of the range. That wouldn't do. Beth closed herself off. _Angles, remember? _She opened her eyes and sighted the bright red center again, this time aiming a little to the left of where she'd aimed before. Her thumb pulled gently back on the hammer like Daryl had showed her and then and fired again. Pull back, Fire. Pull back, fire. Three times in quick timing, one right after the other, just to the right of center and then twice more. That was it. All six bullets. Motion at her peripheral drew her back and Beth gently set down the gun and pulled her glasses off and her earplugs out and turned to face Daryl. She was shaking but she'd never felt so damn** free** in all of her life, not even when she'd gone and climbed the highest tree on the farm and stood in the top branches pretending to be a bird while the wind whipped her hair across her face as a storm rolled in, swift and fierce like she pretended she was.

It was fascinating to watch Beth move through all these emotions that were written so clearly on her face; it was a smile that would haunt his dreams for months to come. Daryl could see the way her brain was working. _Freedom_. In one morning, in the span of less than thirty minutes, she had broken one of the main chains linking her to her childhood. She was no longer defenseless and he could see that change etched down into the depths of her soul. He had given her a gift and as she turned to him with light in her eyes and her body shaking from the sheer impact of breaking away, he caught her tightly in his arms. There was surprise when he realized that she had wrapped her arms around his ribs and was squeezing the breath right out of him. For such a tiny person Beth held such force in her being and if he hadn't been wearing his earplus he would have sworn to high heaven and back that she was saying "_Thank you_." over and over again against his chest. And just like that she let him go and that grin was back and she was bouncing on the balls of her feet with her blonde hair falling out of her hat and catching brightly against her scarf. "Again. I gotta do it again. Help me get it right, Daryl. I wanna be good at this." Her grin was infectious and he could feel a rare smile of his own tugging at his lips in return.

"Alright, blondie. Well the first thing you gotta do is..."

The rest of the time on the range flew by and before she knew it they were packing up and the guys were discussing the prospect of lunch. Something had broken between Beth and Daryl in the time while he was teaching her to shoot. She seemed more comfortable just being with him, bumping his shoulder with hers as she effortlessly skipped past them in the parking lot. When her hat started slipping her slender fingers simply plucked it away, tucked it in her pocket, and let her blonde hair tumble around her shoulders in a wave of bright gold. As he watched her bounce back to the truck Daryl realized it wasn't so much that she was immature as she was an eternal optimist. Beth's unique perspective of the world simply allowed her to be happy and not question it; she just accepted it as it was. There was no doubt in her mind that she deserved happiness. It was something he found himself beginning to admire because Daryl had been running on borrowed luck for years now and it was bound to run out at some point. There wasn't forgiveness written in the cards for a man like him but for the first time since he had gotten lost deep in the woods at the tender age of nine he found himself wondering if redemption was a possibility.

Beth had figured they would drop her off at her dorm and take off but when they got in the truck and she was once again against his side Daryl asked her what she would like to do for food. "We were thinkin' of getting delivery, unless you want something else?" He was struck by the instant look of gratitude that crossed her face as she turned to look at him and realized she was included.

"Delivery is fine with me."

The rest of the ride was spent with her leaning casually against his side as he draped an arm over her shoulders.

The next month passed in a blur of consistent happiness; the first Daryl had felt in a long time. Musically speaking he and Beth were well matched. He found that she was coming over three or four times a week and sometimes they would work, sometimes they would play, and sometimes they would just hang out. The longer Beth was around him the more she was able to let go. He got to see all sides of her. What she called 'dancing it out' to a song (apparently a phrase she had picked up from something called Grey's Anatomy) on Pandora or something that he was playing, the serious part of her as they watched movies. He saw her giggle and he saw her lose her temper (if never actually get angry) and all he wanted was to see more of her. They texted so much that Daryl had actually had to go into the store and upgrade his plan because he had burned through his 300 messages in less than a week. He had no idea how they managed to talk so much, especially when she was seemingly busy all the time. She did have a full class schedule and a social life, after all. When they were bored enough and it was late at night they would actually talk or Skype despite being close enough to walk and see each other. He would keep her company as she did her homework and sometimes they simply worked and never said a word, both of them just taking comfort in the fact that somebody was on the end of the connection. Sometimes she would play bits and pieces of things for him, briefly and quietly because it usually so late but her voice was unearthly and sometimes in the deep depths of his nightmares he would be pulled back by a song on a guitar that somehow...just somehow he knew it was hers.

Beth had grown up in a family of casual touch and communication. She and Maggie would snuggle on the couch and watch movies, feet on the laps of their mother or their brother or their father. It was simply natural for her. She and her siblings would puppy pile on the grass outside the house and just hang out after chores were done, still sticky and hot and tired from working before running off to jump in the river fully clothed. That was the hardest part of their new friendship as far as Daryl was concerned. As close as he and Rick were they were not men for hugs or touching, just the occasional handshake or clap of hand on shoulder or forearm to forearm grasp. He realized that no matter what she was doing, even if she was playing her guitar or studying or even napping, some part of her would be touching him. He'd gotten used to the weight of her feet across his thighs and resting his hand across her shins, the spontaneous touches as he was up and in the kitchen or getting something out of a bookshelf and they happened to cross paths. It opened him up to a whole world of affection and pure vulnerability that he had simply never known before. Daryl had lived in a household (if you could call it that) where touch had been nothing short of a weapon, where being alone and cold and hard meant safety and comfort and security.

Rick had mentioned more than once that Daryl was in danger of 'going soft', jokingly of course but he had no idea how dark of a memory that phrase dragged up. He found himself waking from his nightmares shaking and sweating with the echoes of Merle's voice and his father's belt and 'going soft' plaguing him. Those were the nights he found himself halfway through a bottle of whiskey before walking the distance to her building. Daryl didn't know why he did it. He could have gone anywhere, picked any direction to go, and the place he went was where she lived. The first few times he simply stood and let the chill of the October night settle and ease the whiskey out of his mind along with the fear. A few nights he would lean on the bright and sit in the shadow of the building and watch the street in front of him. One night it finally happened. Her light was on despite it being three in the morning and he called. Daryl was drunk, scared, angry, closed off and desperate. He just didn't know what else to do.

It rung. And rung. And then her sleepy voice answered the phone, low and quiet.

"Daryl?"

"Hey..." There was a long pause.

"Are you drunk?" her voice was still tinged with something dark and blurry.

"A bit."

"Where are you?"

Another pause. "Outside." He saw a figure check behind the blinds.

"Here? Like, my outside?"

"Yeah."

"Hang on." The phone clicked off. There was no questioning, no telling him to go fuck off, no yelling at him for calling so late. But had he really expected that of her? Beth, with her sweet smile and kind nature. She fucking trapped spiders and put them outside instead of killing them and opened the window for the flies to get out. He should have known she would never turn him away like this. What had he been thinking?

Beth lacked the foresight to put on some sort of coat or shoes or semblance of heat and here she was standing outside in a tank top and mesh shorts at the end of October with her arms crossed over her chest. She was standing in front of a drunken, shirtless, barefoot redneck wearing only a pair of unbuttoned jeans and was trying to persuade him to come inside. "Come on, Daryl. Somebody's gonna call the cops on you if you just stand here all night. I'm gettin' cold." Beth reached out between them and took his hand in hers and tugged. He followed her with his head down and watched the patterned rug of the hallway pass under his eyes and as the elevator _ding_ed softly he brought his head up. He'd never been in her room before. Briefly he wondered what it was like.

Beth had apparently fallen asleep at her desk in the middle of studying something. There were books scattered and open, an uncapped highlighter had found a place in the middle of one, rolled there by gravity. Her bed was made, something fluffy, thick and warm-looking with water-color style blue and purple flowers on a white background. Purple pillows, blue sheets. Daryl stood in the middle of the small room and simply stared, taking it all in. Her walls were covered. Poetry, posters, photographs, art. It seemed as though every inch of wall was covered. There were christmas lights strung around the desk and bed in a pale blue. Beth's computer was on screen saver mode, photos of her and her friends from high school and her family. It was so normal. It was the life he'd wanted since he was early enough to recognize what the desire was. Where Daryl had reached out and found nothing but harm and pain she had grown up in a bubble of love. Where he was hard and scarred and deformed she was nothing but soft and unlined. She was his opposite in just about every way. There was another wash of pain across his chest and he settled into her seat at her desk with his head hung low.

Beth had never seen him like this. He was utterly defeated and defenseless. Daryl was a fairly large man but she felt like she could have knocked him over with a feather. He was broken. If Beth was going to be honest she was freaking out. He was starting to shiver and was frozen when she touched him. He smelled rank of sharp sweat, the kind created from fear, and alcohol. Her hands came to caress the side of his face and pull his face up so he would look at her. "Stay here for a second, okay? Don't go wandering off on me." She had played nursemaid and mother to a good chunk of her friends over the last year and some. This, at least, was familiar territory. Beth trod down to a friend's door, had a quiet discussion with the shirtless young man who groggily opened the door and came away with a pair of mesh basketball shorts and jogged back to her room.

She returned to find Daryl exactly where she had left him, staring at her computer screen. His gaze moved to her when she opened the door. Beth could feel the weight of his stare as she realized she wasn't too far off from naked but the man needed a shower before he could sleep this off. She refused to have her bed smelling like a bar. Beth tried to pull him to his feet with a grunt but he wouldn't budge from his spot at her desk. She could feel her temper rising just a hair as she snapped her fingers in front of his eyes and raised her voice. "Hey. Daryl. I'm willin' to help but you're bigger than I am. You gotta help me a little here, okay?" Something must have clicked because he got to his feet and Beth pulled his arm over his shoulders and hooked her arm around his waist. Even with his 'help' it took some serious maneuvering before she could get him down towards the bathroom at the end of the hall and it was even more difficult to get his jeans off (and wouldn't it figure he was naked under that?) and get him under the water.

The water is what finally snapped him out of his daze enough to function. Beth's gentle touches across his hips and his legs, the gentle tug at his ankles as she tried to get him to step out of his battered and now-soaked jeans. He blinked some of the drops out of water from his eyes and scrubbed his hand across his face. And then...he realized that he was naked and Beth was there in her tiny camisole and those tiny shorts, just as wet as he was, and he thanked God for all the whiskey he had consumed. If he'd been even remotely close to sober there would have been no hiding how he reacted to that particular stimuli of cloth nearly turned transparent. He felt fingers in his hair and down across his shoulders and his back. The delicate touch stopped at his hips and somehow he got a sense that he was clean. The grime and fear was washing away and then the water was shut off and she was handing him a towel. Everything was hazy and confusing but he was functional enough to dry himself off and get into the shorts she handed him; men's shorts. Shorts that came along with a fierce stab of jealousy and possessiveness that vanished as quickly as it had come. He realized dimly after they had gotten back to her room that she was still wet. He handed her the towel and slowly climbed up into her bed and under her covers. It was only after he'd been settled in under the covers with the wall at his back did Daryl realize she hadn't really touched the ropes of scars that were across his back any more than was strictly necessary, or even admitted their existence. She must have seen them, she'd been staring at him and washing him but she didn't ask or linger or question about them at all. Beth was the first person to simply accept them as part of who he was, as a sign of a dark and tumultuous path that had led him to where he was today. The only person who had reacted like that (or not reacted) was Rick.

He was safely in bed before Beth took the time to dry off her hair and change into something dry. She had a feeling he may not remember but she faced the door anyway before changing into a sports bra and a clean (and DRY) pair of shorts and undies. She fumbled and cursed the fact that she hadn't had a chance to do laundry this week; that was literally the last pair of underwear she had and she had run out of sleep-able t-shirts two days ago. Now, though, there was another problem. Since he had clearly claimed the bed where else was she supposed to crash? Anything was better than the desk she'd been sleeping on before but the floor wasn't exactly what she'd had in mind. _Fuck it._ It was her bed and her room and he had come to her. Beth huffed quietly but wasn't going to get kicked out of her bed at four in the morning on a Wednesday. She slid under the covers and reached for the light, clicking it off and she settled into the dark realizing that she wouldn't quite be making it to class the next morning.

Despite being drunk Daryl was awake long after Beth had fallen asleep. He was tormented by the view he'd gotten while she had changed. It was fleeting, just a hint of smooth pale skin, shoulders, curves, and something lacy and blue. Then, of all things, she'd gotten into bed beside him. Somehow in her sleep she had curled herself around his side as he was on his back, her soft, damp, hair forming a halo around her face and over his shoulder from where she was resting on his chest. She was extraordinary. Beth had so calmly accepted the fact that he had shown up drunk on a weekday with no purpose. This amazing woman (how could he have ever thought her a child?) had seen him for who he really was; a coward. She had seen him and not turned him away or spurned him or mocked him. Those blue eyes of hers had taken everything in from the alcohol to his marred skin without a word. He had been expecting an interrogation at the least or at the worst flat out refusal and denial of help. But.. Beth wasn't the type of person to leave somebody out in the cold, not when they needed help. She had taken care of him with nothing but compassion. The soft floral smell of her shampoo (jasmine?) combined with the beating of her heart and the warmth of her body against his was enough to finally lull him to sleep with his nose buried in her hair.

Beth woke to a warm body in her bed and her alarm blared at her at after four measly hours of sleep. The events of the night came rushing back and her eyes opened wide even as her body stilled realized realized that she, Beth Greene, had not only overslept and missed her class but also missed her Skype date with her sister. And then she realized that she was sharing the same bed as Daryl Dixon, that she could feel the strength and solidity of his muscles under her arm and the searing heat of his chest pressed against her cheek. _Fuck._ Beth slowly detached herself and slid out of bed before silencing her alarm. She spared a moment to stare at him with a hand pressed over her mouth. Crap. What exactly was she supposed to do now? She could leave. She could claim she had a class, leave him a note, let him get the hell out of her room with dignity. It was a tempting thought but...he had been seriously messed up. Something was going on with him and as his friend (did friends drunkenly sleep in the same bed?) she owed it to him to at least try to talk. Her feet carried her across the narrow room again and again as she wracked her brain for a solution that would satisfy her need to run and also her need to be a decent person. She could try and make the conversation easier for him and Maggie had told her once that the secret to get men to open was food. It had worked for her and Glenn, after all. There was a tiny little place down the road that made the best 'southern' food in the city. Good comfort food made by a Southern transplant that reminded her of home. The blonde paused long enough to start some coffee in the hopes it would help him stay until she got back.

Beth changed into a pair of jeans and her sweatshirt deciding not bothering with a shirt anyway because he'd been passed out long before she'd gotten into bed. She took a moment to open her notebook to an available page and scrawl out a note for him before ripping it out and taping it to the mirror on the back of her door. Then she grabbed her wallet and her keys and left.

Daryl woke to silence and a stuffy head with no shirt and in a pair of shorts that weren't his. Beth had already left so he decided to count his blessings and get the hell out of here before he had to explain anything that was the fiasco of last night. He threw back the covers with a grunt as the heat left him, searching desperately for his shoes as his feet hit the ground. No shoes. Had he come with shoes? No. He hadn't. Fuck. He ran a hand through his hair before spotting the note on the mirror.

**Morning, Daryl! Ran out for breakfast. It's good, trust me.**

**Stick around. Coffee is already made.**

**-B**

Even her note sounded perky. He couldn't believe it. Breakfast? Daryl met his own eyes in the mirror and took the time to seriously look at himself and came up with a sick feeling in his gut; he looked terrible. There were deep circles around his eyes and he had no shirt, no shoes, and that meant he couldn't even get coffee on the walk back. But...Beth had her own coffee maker. And she'd left him some in the pot along with a mug. Every instinct he had was screaming at him to run but he couldn't do that without hurting her. Yes, he needed her for the grade but this was so much more than that. The thing Daryl wanted to do was hurt her and she'd trapped him by carefully extending an invitation to stay, both written and with her actions. Instead he settled his bulk down into the chair next to the tiny desk and written words along a page caught his eye, the notebook she'd gotten the paper out of. It looked to be a personal notebook with the beginnings of a song penned in her neat hand. He knew he should not have looked. Staring down at this notebook Daryl knew it was wrong of him. That if she had ever looked at his counterpart he would be furious. And yet...he couldn't stop himself. There wasn't a whole lot of it on this page, just enough. Enough to cause an uncomfortable knot in his chest that he couldn't readily identify. There was a trace of a tune sketched out with notes that was beautiful in its simplicity and clearly just an idle thought, the focus here was the words and not the song itself.

I've got this friend  
I don't think you know him  
He's not much for words  
He's hid in his hardened way

Oh I've got this friend  
A loveless romantic  
All that he really wants  
Is someone to want him back

Oh, if the right one came  
If the right one came along  
Oh, If the right one came, along

I've got this friend  
I don't think you know her  
She sings a simple song  
It sounds a lot like his 

Oh I've got this friend  
Holding onto her heart  
Like it's a little secret  
Like it's all she's got to give 

It would be such an asinine thing to assume it was written about him when he really knew nothing about her. He didn't know a whole lot about her friends and while she talked about her family this clearly wasn't written for one of them. There was longing behind it and parts of it were scratched out and rewritten again but it couldn't be about him. Not even he was that arrogant. It wasn't about him but there was a faint, faint glimmer of hope that maybe it was.

Daryl left the notebook as he had found it and stared instead at the photos on the walls. It was a clear-cut picture of her life spread along four walls, fingers tracing over the people in the images as he went and looked at them all carefully one by one as he held onto his mug of dark coffee. Beth at a river with a group of teenagers jumping off a rock down into a deep pool with her arms folded across her chest and her hair streaming against gravity. Beth in an arena lit by bright lights against the dark navy of the sky, on a horse going after a calf with a look of concentration on her face and a black Stetson on her head with a lariat already leaving her gloved hand. Beth sitting on the porch with her sister and her guitar on a summer night. Beth in a tight, short, form fitting blue dress and sky high heels with a boy in a tuxedo. Beth in a long, pale golden gown that was cut deep in the front and close around her hips before falling in gentle folds to her feet. Her hair was up this time but she was also with the same boy who was in another tuxedo. Another pang of jealousy that left a bitter, alkaline taste in his mouth. Beth at football games, in 'selfies' with her friends. Lots of hot weather and hazy heat and photos Maggie had stolen as Beth sat out on a green lawn with her guitar, dressed in a soft beige halter top and a pair of cutoffs with her hair piled ontop of her head. Beth surrounded by riot of reds, oranges, and yellows of fall as she walked and laughed her way down a dirt road. Beth in her graduation gown standing tall next to her father, her mother, her sister, her brother, her hair in a side braid and a look of triumph on her face. Beth camping deep in the mountains with her siblings. Beth at the aquarium here in Boston, at the beach, at the Common, at a Red Sox game in Kenmore square, one photo of her group of college girlfriends walking down the road in a deserted Central Square late at night, arms linked, short skirts and glittery tops and high heels as they tried to hail a cab. It was easy enough to pick her form out of the line, all pale leg, clad in a short black skirt that hugged the curve of her hips. Beth on Newbury street and the Freedom Trail. Beth at a Bruins game holding a flask high in the nosebleeds and cheering with her friends. Beth. Beth. Beth. Beth. Beth. Beth. She was everywhere and nowhere at the same time. Daryl was surrounded by her, absorbing the very essence of who she was, fingers tracing over smiles and soft-looking cascades of hair. He was drowning in her. Then his ears heard the lock turn in the door behind him and he turned around to be greeted with the smell of food and his pixie-like little friend (friend?).

In the end they didn't talk about anything relating to Daryl or to why he had shown up drunk and incoherent in front of her building. They talked about how she was a passable cook and how she'd grown up, Daryl peppering her with questions even as he dug into a chicken fried steak and biscuits and gravy out of a styrofoam container. The duo ended up sitting on the floor drinking coffee out of mugs and talking and laughing and if they'd taken the time to admit it, they would have realized that this thing, whatever it was, felt natural and right and easy between them. All Beth knew was that this was one of the best days she'd had since she had returned to college after a long summer home.


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Well I'm sorry for the delay, folks. Between my trip and a family illness I haven't had much time to write. In fact, I'm heading to Florida tomorrow until Sunday so it may be a little while between chapters. In light of that, this is a little longer and a little bit fluffier. I figured I would leave you all in a good place before we kick into the drama that will ensue next chapter. As promised, here are the links for the songs. The first is called "My Father's Father" by The Civil Wars and the second is called "Tip of my Tongue" by the same group. Videos and stuff aren't mine, I tried to find the best quality. I know that FF won't let me post links so I'm going to muck with it and you'll be able to figure it out. Promise. Dot=. Slash= / And take out the ( ) and the space. Listed in order.**

**www dot youtube dot com slash watch (?v=l) CxsHqX_-S8**

**www dot youtube dot com slash watch (?v=H) -RtrpwIME0**

Near the end of the month Beth and Daryl had decided to do an open mic night down in Revere. Rick was coming along to film it so they could submit the video for credit. The first time she had sat down and gone through his song titled "My Father's Father", and played the notes across her fingers hearing his voice, after the last note had fallen she had simply stared at him. The song helped fill in bits of his past in an annoyingly vague manner. Daryl was sitting on the floor leaning back against the arm chair with his guitar across his lap and he busied himself tuning his already tuned guitar. Beth cleared her throat, "Again? If we're gonna do this I want us to do it right." There was a look of gratitude that crossed his face at the distinct lack of discussion on where these words came from. "I have some ideas..." The pair went back and forth for a while and even though Daryl didn't necessarily appreciate having somebody break down his work like this he did have to admit that having a second set of ears was useful, especially ears that heard things differently than his. With Beth's help what would have been a flat and one-dimensional tune was suddenly rich and mournful. When it was time for Beth's song she handed him the papers and his jaw nearly dropped. This was the finished product of the one he'd seen partially written when he had spent the night in her room. Daryl scanned the lyrics and the notes penned, letting the melody run through his fingers and into the maple wood of his guitar.

The bar was packed as Rick, Daryl, and Beth rolled up to the gravel parking lot and found a space. She was nervous; they both were. This was their first performance together in front of an audience. Before tonight it had simply been fun but now things were getting serious. They were creating content together and realizing that they sounded better together than they did apart. Beth put her guitar across her back and Daryl had his over one shoulder as they entered the bar. The word "packed" did not do the place justice; it was crammed wall to wall with people. They had already been signed up and had ended up in the middle of the pack and it looked like they would be waiting for quite a while before they could go up themselves. At least it was limited to one song per act. It should help cut down on the time. Daryl glanced over to see Beth looking a little pale and lost, reaching back to link their fingers together and give her hand a squeeze before he leaned over to talk in her ear. "You got this. You've played in front of people before, you told me 'bout it. This isn't any different. Go find a table, I'll meet you there." For one there was no sarcasm, no names, just a rare moment where Daryl allowed himself to shine through his rough exterior. Beth rolled her shoulders before heading to the side of the venue where there seemed to be one last open table. Rick bumped his friend's shoulder with his own as he passed. "She's really freaking out isn't she?"

"I don't know why. She's done this before." Daryl's obliviousness was showing. The pair sidled up to the bar and waited until the guy had a chance to come around and take their orders.

"But not with you."

Daryl turned to look at his roommate with puzzlement written all over his face. "How is that any different?" Rick shook his head in amazement. He had been appraised of his roommate's drunken appearance at his young friend's room and whatever it was that happened (or hadn't) after. There were no secrets between Daryl and Rick, they were closer than brothers.

"Look, after everything she's done for you, you're seriously telling me you don't see it? At all?"

The cop was pushing his boundaries and Daryl snapped at him. "You clearly figured it out, just fuckin' tell me!" Rick raised an eyebrow at him but was used to his roommate's little outbursts.

"What I'm saying, Daryl, is that she likes you."

His heart clenched. Part of him didn't want to believe it; he'd be setting himself up for major heartache. He'd never been close to anybody in his life without it turning into a disaster and crumbling into ash at his touch. His mother, perhaps, but she'd died when he was young. He hadn't had many friends because he wasn't exactly what you would call sociable. Daryl was a loner through and through. As terrifying as the prospect was he hadn't really had a girlfriend. As a teenager he'd been too much of an outcast and when he'd moved to Boston he hadn't had a job, hadn't had a place...he hadn't had anything at all. Not exactly prime material for boyfriend. When he had moved in with Rick there had been a woman, another student, but not for long; he'd sabotaged himself every step of the way until she couldn't take it anymore and left after barely a month. Since then it had been a small number of one night stands due to his fear of rejection and abandonment even if he told himself it was because he was better off alone. Rick knew this and that must be why he was telling him. Rick was snapping his fingers in Daryl's face.

"Daryl. Look, don't stress it, but I'm just sayin' I think she wrote that song about you. And I think you're an idiot for ignoring it." Rick grabbed his drink and went over to the table leaving Daryl to wait for a second glass of whiskey. Was it true? Was Rick right? Could he be right? Could Daryl be lucky enough to have such a well adjusted woman wanting him in her life? Was he choosing to overlook the fact that maybe his confusing, convoluted feelings might be reciprocated? He shook his head and ran a hand through his scruffy hair. He didn't know what she would ever see him; he was nothing. White trash. A glorified angry redneck who snapped at people that got close. He was angry and violent with words and actions when he felt threatened. Daryl had wanted a home and a life and stability since before he became aware of what it was and what he was missing but he wasn't sure if he deserved it. Not after everything he had done, everything he'd witnessed, everything he'd experienced. He was tainted and rotten and broken, a ghost of a man in an empty shell. How could she not see that he was bad news for her? More importantly was the question of what would he do now. Lungs expanded against his ribcage as he took a deep breath and grabbed the two glasses of whiskey from the dark wood of the bar and headed to the table. The glasses were put down on the table one in front of Beth and one before his own seat, and he nudged her arm.

"Got this for you." He raised an eyebrow as she took a deep drink. "Easy, blondie." The time was racing by and the names on the list dwindled more rapidly than he would have ever have thought possible. They were up next. He brushed his dark hair out of his eyes and caught the slightest tremor in the tips of his fingers. Daryl would never have admitted it but he was nervous. Recording and singing in his apartment was not quite in the same league as performing in front of a very new and very real audience and now his grades were on the line. More than just grades; his entire future was at stake.

The walk to the stage was impossibly long and the time it took to stand up on the stage with the lights and the microphones almost had her dizzy. It didn't make sense. Beth had done this before dozens of times. This was nothing new. So why was she so nervous? It had to be Daryl. It was almost as though this was their first major test in musical compatibility and it was one she couldn't afford to fail. Beth looked at Daryl and he looked back at her with an encouraging smile and a nod before introducing them.

"Hey all. My name is Daryl and this is Beth, and we have something we've been working on for a while. It's called 'My Father's Father'." He was no good in front of a crowd and he could feel that he was drowning as the panic rushed over him like a tide. And then he was thrown a blessed life-line; once again in the form of Beth. Her voice cut through the silence and carried a hint of a chuckle and a slight toss of her golden waves over her shoulder.

"We're actually recording this for a class, so if you like us, clap at the end and help out with our grades?" Beth waved cheekily over to where Rick was standing against the wall with Daryl's phone, her grin so bright that it eclipsed the lights. There was a little bit of a laugh as her fingers started to pick out the notes and weave them into the song. They'd found a rhythm during their practice sessions, weaving their voices together while keeping them apart. Some verses were sung by him and some by her.

_I hear something hanging on the wind__  
__I see black smoke up around the bend__  
__I got my ticket__  
__I'm going to go home___

_The leaves have changed a time or two__  
__Since the last time the train came through__  
__I got my ticket and I'm going to go home___

_My father's father's blood is on the track__  
__A sweet refrain drifts in from the past__  
__I got my ticket and I'm going to go home___

_The winding roads that led me here__  
__Burn like coal and dry like tears__  
__So here's my hope__  
__My tired soul__  
__So here's my ticket__  
__I want to go home__  
__Home__  
__Home_

Beth would never tell him so to his face but his song said more about him than Daryl would have liked to admit. While they had never discussed the events that had clearly occurred his words and the melancholy notes that hung heavily in the air painted an accurate picture. If nothing else he was homesick; achingly homesick and unable to return home for what was a myriad of reasons. There were burdens back home, guilt, poverty, abuse, memories. Burdens he ran away from, burdens he likely wouldn't take up again willingly, no matter how much he missed his home. Home was here, now, and Daryl needed to burn the last of the south away from his bones and purge his body of the memories. They played together like they had been this doing this their entire lives. The world vanished away and it was just Beth and Daryl and the lights on the stage. When the video was watched later there would be Beth, beaming from ear to ear and Daryl simply staring at her with a wistful expression as they were surrounded by thunderous applause.

The sound of the crowd brought Daryl back into his own mind and he collected his thoughts before grabbing his guitar by the neck and stepping down the stairs at the side. He turned to say something to her as they approached the table and realized there was nobody there to talk to. Beth was still on the stage and the grin was gone and replaced by a small, very nervous smile. "Since I'm already up here they figured I could just go again. This is called 'Tip of my Tongue'." He saw her shoulders roll under the black fabric of her jacket before her fingers began to pluck softly on the strings of her guitar. Her eyes were fixed onto the back of the room as she crooned softly into the microphone.

_You're a red string tied to my finger  
A little love letter I carry with me  
You're sunlight  
Smoke rings and cigarettes  
Outlines and kisses from silver screens_

Oh dear, never saw you comin'  
Oh my  
Look what you have done  
You're my favorite song  
Always on the tip of my tongue

You own me with whispers like poetry  
Your mouth is a melody I memorize  
Mmm, so sweet  
I hear it echo everywhere I go  
Day and night

Oh dear, never saw you comin'  
Oh my  
Look what you have done  
You're my favorite song  
Always on the tip of my tongue  
The tip of my tongue

Oh  
Oh dear  
Never saw you comin'  
Oh my  
Look what you have done  
You're my favorite song  
Always on  
Oh, oh

Oh dear  
Never saw you comin'  
Oh my  
Look what you've done  
Oh  
You're my favorite song  
Always on the tip of my tongue

The voice echoing out the speakers was sweet enough to gloss over everything else in the room and when silence finally fell the place exploded with cheers, bangs on the table, whistles. He watched her stand, smile, and skip off the stage. Dimly Daryl felt Rick's hand clap onto his shoulder in a very silent _I told you so._

The ride back into Boston was filled with banter between Beth and Rick that seemed to ease the emptiness in both the cabin of the truck and the hollow place in his chest. Neither Daryl nor Beth had felt comfortable putting their guitars in the bed of the truck and so the cab was even more crowded than usual. Beth was pressing into his side with his arm around her shoulder and a blaze of heat where her hand rested on his knee. Even with her welcome warmth against his ribs it was a delight to be let out in front of her dorm and listen to the truck roar down the quiet street with his guitar on the seat. But now...now they were standing in the shadows outside of her building. Alone. Daryl could hear the scuffing of her boots on the concrete and he could smell that undefinably floral perfume she wore that carried through the chill of the night. Blues tracked the white mist that left the soft pink curves of her lips. Their eyes locked and he heard a sharp intake of breath that he might have missed if the night hadn't been so utterly silent. Daryl stepped close, reaching up to brush her blonde locks behind her ear and his thumb traced across her cheekbone. He hesitated and tilted up her chin, his voice shaking and filled with tremors and anxiety. "Beth...I..." God damn it all. The hand not caressing her face came down to rest on her waist over the coat and he stepped even closer before leaning in.

"BETH!" She jumped at the sound of her name as Amy came up the sidewalk. Damn it all. Daryl's hands dropped to his sides as defeat crossed his eyes.

"I'm...gonna go. I'll talk to you tomorrow, kay?" Before he knew what he was doing he kissed her forehead and turned to the night. Everything in his being was screaming at to turn around, to go back to her, to kiss her like he meant it, kiss her well enough to convince her of even giving him a chance. But he was afraid, and fear gets the best of every human being on the planet. He was less than a quarter way down the block when he heard Amy's yelp of pain get cut off by their closing door.

A few days later was the big college holiday. Halloween had fallen on a Saturday this year and Beth had been convinced by some of her girlfriends to come out to a bar downtown; one of them even had an extra costume. So this was how she found herself in a Little Red Riding Hood costume with full makeup that turned her skin to porcelain, heading out onto the green line armed only with her cell phone, a debit card and ID, and her keys. Her blonde locks were tumbling in loose curls past her shoulders and her eyes were adorned with a copper eyeshadow that faded softly into a dark brown. Topping it off was pure red lipstick in a soft matte that helped Beth attain the look of a storybook character, gentle and pale. The line to get in the door was longer than it had any right to be and she found herself texting Daryl to pass the time, taking a good natured ribbing from her friend Amy in the process. The girls were almost as invested in her friendship with the mysterious older musician as she was, especially after Amy had interrupted what she was convinced was going to be a kiss. In true Daryl fashion every time Beth brought it up she encountered radio silence until she changed the topic. Her friends, though, were not letting up. They were curious about him and peppered her with questions she never actually answered. Her lips were curling up at the corners as her thumbs flew. Somehow his rough manner found a way through in his texting, as did his sometimes insufferable attitude.

_'you never actually said what you were doing tonight daryl'_

**'it's halloween blondie what do you think'**

_'rick made you dress up and dragged you out'_

**'nailed it where you at anyway'**

Beth hesitated, it's not like it would matter anyway, right? Her thumbs tapped away as she shifted her weight from one tall black pump to the other, hesitating before she hit the blue send button on her iPhone screen.

_'liquor store'_

**'no kidding'**

_'why?'_

Once again she encountered silence. It was damnably infuriating. It was also pretty immature, if she was going to be honest with herself. Anything that made him uncomfortable was automatically off-limits. Beth knew he had a difficult past. In fact, that was all she knew. He'd resisted her attempts to encourage conversation and stonewalled anything about how he was currently feeling. It was almost like he was new to all of this, figuring out all of this for the first time with no baseline for how his emotions functioned. She glanced back at her screen to see the little 'typing' symbol, lips pinched in frustration as the symbol vanished and no words appeared. Well that could mean anything, really. Beth's lips ended up in a pout as the line moved forward. It was a ridiculous concept, really, a whole bunch of people lining up outside dressed like idiots so they could go pay to get drunk. Beth wasn't exactly against the bar scene and she had Maggie's old ID with her, thankfully her sister had been in a 'blonde' phase at the time and ended up hating the photo so much she 'lost' her license and went to go get a new one instead. She'd given it to Beth partially as a joke. There wasn't a whole lot of resemblance between them but sometimes it was close enough to make the cut. Tonight it worked and the group of girls managed to get inside the dark building. Clubs had this innate ability to muffle all sound except the music and make the air thick and immovable. This place was no different. It always packed in here given that it was one of the "it" places in the city and it was a weekend in a city filled with college students. Beth made her way to the bar with her friend Amy, leaning casually against the wood with her hip and waiting for the bartender. Amy's eyes widened as she saw something over Beth's shoulder and leaned in under the hood of Beth's red 'cloak'. "You're never gonna believe this but Daryl just showed up. I don't think he's seen you yet." Beth started to turn but Amy grabbed her hand to stop her. "He knows your here, right?" Beth wasn't putting the dots together.

"Well yeah, but what does that have to do with it?"

"He's looking for you, dumb ass." Amy smacked her upside the head. "Let him find you. We had this talk today remember? About how your mom's-" Beth sighed.

"I don't want to talk about that, Amy. Especially not here. I just want to forget about it."

Amy nodded her head. "Then we'll forget about it. Properly. Let him come find you, we're taking shots." By the time the blondes had run up a tab and at least four shots of tequila each Beth had forgotten that Daryl was on the same block, much less in the same room. The music was loud and reverberating through her bones as she and Amy danced away and let go of everything. The petticoat swayed with her hips and her hair was tossed over her shoulder carelessly as she danced with her friend.

This was a yearly ritual. There were several holidays in which he was required to participate, among them being Halloween, Saint Patrick's Day, and every three day weekend in the calendar. Daryl did manage to change up his costume every year but he was fairly low-budget to begin with. This year he got away with a pair of dollar-store clip-on wolf ears and a tail paired with a partially unbuttoned black dress shirt unbuttoned with sleeves rolled up to his elbows over a pair of dark jeans; there was a dress code after all. Usually he just hung out in the corner until Rick found somebody he wanted to dance with. At some point he would start drinking and find somebody to dance with near the very end the night, just long enough to get his social requirement to Rick fully completed. This year, though, was different. Beth was somewhere in this building and that changed...everything. This was no longer a social obligation and now it was a game of 'find his blonde'. It was complicated, sure, because there were a hell of a lot of blondes in the place tonight. There was also no way of telling how far back in line she had been or what she was wearing. It would serve him well to wait and watch from the corner with glass of whiskey in his hand and a flask in his back pocket (he was cheap and this shit was expensive). Daryl watched the scene, scanning across the crowd. Nothing. Maybe he just needed a different vantage point. He shifted through the crowd from one corner to the other, passing a girl dressed like Tinkerbell and her hooded counterpart. He stopped. Something about Tinkerbell was damn familiar; he had seen her before. They locked eyes and he knew. She was one of the faces frequently featured on Beth's wall... he'd heard of her before. Amy. She was also from Georgia, if he called correctly, and had a sister who was a civil rights lawyer. **She **was the one who had interrupted him the other night as he had attempted to kiss his little musician, which meant that Beth wasn't going to be far behind. He took a good long look at little Red but he couldn't figure out enough. It could have been her because the legs looked familiar but with the hood up there was no way to know for sure. He melted back into the shadows of the edge of the room and regretted the motion when the pair at the bar starting drinking. Daryl's own glass was empty and he turned to balance the glass on the edge of a table and hide the flask as he refilled it again and again. He decided to buy some time, lurking on the edge of the crowd and just looking over the mass of people in front of him. He could see Rick and some willowy brunette dancing near the edge. He checked his watch; more than an hour and a half had passed since Beth had entered the bar. She had come with her friends looking for a good time and he was inclined to let her have it before interrupting. The group of girls hadn't even made it in until after eleven, but now it was late enough that he didn't feel guilty stealing her from her friends. There was a flash of red out in the middle of the dance floor and he could see her; the hood was down and he would get flashes of her face as she danced and moved her body effortlessly with the music. There was nothing better than watching a musician dance; it was truly art in motion. They had such intimate knowledge with how music worked and motion to music was just an instinct buried deep in the construction of their brains. Scratch that. The only thing better than watching her dance would be dancing with her himself. He'd danced with women before, this wasn't anything new and yet here he was scared in the corner like that lost and lonely teenager he used to be.

**No.**

He was surprised at how forcefully the thought had crossed his brain. He wasn't that person anymore. Daryl squared his shoulders and took a long swig of the flask before capping it off again and putting it back in his pocket. He was a coward but this was a party and he was allowed to dance with a pretty girl if he wanted to. There was nobody here to tell him otherwise. There was no Merle in his life anymore. His father was dead. He shouldn't be terrified. His heart shouldn't be pounding in his ears, his hands shouldn't be shaking, and he certainly shouldn't be stumbling on his way over to her. Daryl paused as he threaded his way through the crowd to take a deep breath and sidle up to her.

"Fancy meetin' you here, blondie. Or should I call you Red?" For her part Beth looked flawless, her makeup making those blue eyes of hers pop out at him even in the dark. The under bust corset type structure of her costume was doing excellent things for her figure and he found himself caught in a very long once-over. It was apparently mutual and one of her fingers came up to tweak at the ear pinned in his hair.

"Daryl. Or should I just call you Wolfie?" Damn. She'd had an opportunity to come up with something amazing and she'd blown it. She could see Amy slipping away to join their other friends out of the corner of her eye, leaving Beth along with Daryl. The blonde moved into the space her friend had vacated and drew Daryl in after her with a smile. "Dance with me, Daryl!" She didn't give him too much of a say in the matter and threaded her arms around his neck and pulled him close to her body. At this distance (or lack thereof) she could smell the freshness of his skin and whatever he used as a soap. They were both tipsy and his hands had started at her waist but dropped low onto her hips before closing the remaining distance between them. Beth's mind was racing behind the tequila because Amy had been right (she usually was). Beth needed to go after what she wanted because life was short and _fuck everything else_. She was so busy worrying about being the good daughter, the good friend, the good student, the good sister, that she wasn't even living her life to the fullest anymore. What use was having an opportunity open up in your life if you weren't willing to take it? Daryl wasn't here by accident. Her friends had not chosen this place by accident. It wasn't anything as drastic as fate and cosmic alliance but it gave her courage knowing that maybe, just maybe, this was where she was supposed to be. Here in this moment with him. Beth's breathing was shallow from more from nerves than by dancing. She could feel him waiting and the southern girl was on fire. Every cell in her body was responding to him and the tingles where his breath met her skin was enough to make her heart race. Maybe it was the tequila. Maybe it was simply that she'd had her world shaken and needed to reconnect with something. Maybe it was both. Whatever the reason was she found herself looking up into his blue eyes under the fringe of his dark bangs and made a decision that would change the rest of her life.

Daryl was drowning in her. Her hips were moving liquidly under his hands as their hips pressed together and his face was blazing with her cheek resting against his. He could feel the flutter of her lashes against his cheekbone and was rewarded with a small sound as he drew her closer and pressed her against his chest. He saw her pull back with hesitation on her face. Hesitation turned into resolve and as he locked eyes with hers and barely inches away from each other, it happened. She leaned forward as one hand moved to cup his face before sliding to rest at the intersection of his jawline and his neck, and then her lips met his with gentle pressure. Relief washed over him in the form of a sweet, simple meeting of lips, soft and quiet and sweet. Relief that he didn't have to make the first move. Relief and joy at her confirmation of her feelings for him. Relief that he didn't have to be afraid of her, of offending her, of pressuring her. She didn't pull back from him, either. Beth rested her forehead against his with her eyes closed, barely breathing at all as though if she were to change something about this moment it would vanish from them forever.

"I won't say I'm sorry, Daryl. I won't because I don't regret it." Now she did pull back, anxiously searching his face for any sign of what he was feeling but she said no more. She had spoken her piece and acted on her heart and now would be the moment to know if her boldness paid off. She was watching, watching, watching. Relief and comfort...something else, something she didn't recognize, was etched across his face. Tension built. They were standing still among a crowd of moving people, an isolated eddy of stillness in the massive moving sea of people around them. Daryl's hands came up to cradle her face, to pull her close into a second kiss. Where the first one had been gentle and tender, an expression of hesitant hearts, the second was strong and sharp, need and desire mixed together as he kissed her with a ferocity she knew he had possessed somewhere deep inside. Suddenly they were clinging to each other desperately with the strength of people who needed affirmation that somewhere, somebody in the world cared about them. Time seemed to slow as they pulled apart for the second time. Beth leaned in against his ear, the proximity making him shiver.

"C'mon...let's go somewhere quiet?" Her fingers linked with his and the strength of her grip surprised him. It was almost as though she was afraid to let him go, that if she did he would vanish and never reappear again. Daryl nodded his silent assent and threaded their way through the crowd and towards the door, picking up his coat from the check on the way. Once they were outside it was a whole other world, just traffic and street lights and people walking from once place to another, ignoring the muffled music pouring from the building. She could see him heave a sigh of relief as they left the bar and emerged back into the city with their hands clasped tight between them. They found their way to the corner of the building and she paused, the sharpness of the night starting to sink past the flimsy cloth of her costume and making her shiver.

He could feel the tremor that wracked her body carry down into her hand and then into his. Daryl managed to maneuver his beat up old leather jacket over her shoulders, using the motion to draw her into the shadows of the building and pull her close. If Daryl was going to be truthful with himself he could have stood here on this corner and stolen kisses from her forever. Beth was pressed against him and his arms had wrapped over her leather-clad shoulders while hers had stolen around his waist.

"So."

It was Beth who had broken the silence between them with a smile on her lips and in her voice. "Clearly you aren't pissed at me. Care to let in that head of yours for once?" It was a risk, she knew that, but she was feeling better than she had in days and somehow the blonde knew luck was on her side tonight.

"It's...complicated. I ain't been able to do much of this stuff. Romantic stuff, I mean." Daryl's voice broke off into a mumble but she remained quiet, allowing him time to pull his thoughts together, content to just stand with his arms around her and laying kisses on his jaw.

"We have all the time in the world, Daryl. It's not like I'm asking you to marry me or anything." Beth stole another kiss from him, not giving him a chance to dwell. Instead she tried to vanish all space between them, fusing their molecules together by sheer force of will. She kissed him as though it was the only thing that mattered, the way their tongues met and the way he opened up. He may not have been good with words but Daryl was a man of action and he communicated as such. She found herself pressed against the wall of the bar with his hands incapable of staying still. They tangled themselves in her hair, stroked along her sides and up under the curve of her breast, dropping down to her hips. By the time his lips focused on her neck she was breathless and dizzy and clinging to him under an onslaught of sensory input. She'd been kissed, of course. She hadn't exactly come to college as a virgin but nobody had _ever_ kissed her like this. As though she was the only thing keeping him tethered to the earth. As though she was the only thing in the world that mattered. Daryl nipped at her earlobe, his voice a quiet mumble as his hands stilled on her hips.

"I like you, Beth. I like whatever it is we got goin' on. I just don't know how..." His voice choked off and suddenly she was soothing him, stroking his hair.

"That's it. That's all I need for now, Daryl. That's all I gotta know." Beth cradled his face in her hands. "Besides, you owe me breakfast, remember?" She felt him leaning his head into her hands, laying a kiss against the inside of her wrist.

A palpable relief washed over him and he sank into her arms, burying his face in the crook of her neck. _She understood. _She wasn't asking for anything he couldn't give. Beth was accepting him with his faults, giving him time to sort out his complex emotions and offering him kindness and care and stability while he figured everything out. She was willing to wait on him, to allow whatever it was between them to grow at it's own pace. He didn't know what he had done to deserve this, to deserve her, to have a partner who thought of others before she thought of herself. He may not have deserved this; she was too good for him but he was going to make sure that he was worthy of her from now until she left him. Daryl realized, pressed against her neck and inhaling her scent with her fingers stroking across his hair, that he would never leave her of his own will. His voice was a rough mumble into her ear. "I'll call us a cab and text Rick. You should let Amy know."

Beth tipped his head up and lay another kiss on his lips. "Somehow I think she already knows."


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Well, here's chapter four. I'm sorry it took me so long but I had a lot going on and my visit to see my dad got extended. Regardless I'm home now and will be until late August so I'm going to aim for a chapter a week. This chapter is on a totally different vibe and I'm thrilled. Now we get to the drama in all forms so hold on to your hats, ladies and gents. You'll recognize the song in this chapter because it comes directly from the soundtrack of the show. "You Are the Wilderness" by the Voxhaul Broadcast. .com (slash) watch?v=QjesDIGTmGE**

**As always, feel free to leave comments and likes and kudos because it makes me thrive as a writer. ~LA**

It was nearly time for Thanksgiving break and the city was alive with the bustle of students who yearned to be home and were instead drowning in midterms, Beth among them. She was waiting in the middle of the Park Street T station for her connection on her way back from a study group that was at the far end of Cambridge. Unfortunately the damn thing had run long and she was now waiting at eleven something on a Monday in an empty station. In truth it was the most deserted she had ever seen it; folks who had to work were already snug in their beds and students were stuffing information into their heads in whatever places still had light and coffee. It looked like it was going to snow tonight with the wind achingly cold and carrying a crisp scent that brushed off the icy sheet of the freshly frozen Charles. It was the kind of wind that no amount of layers could stop, bitter and angry and howling between buildings, whipping across your face like fire. Beth had given up on her appearance some time the week before, it simply wasn't worth the effort. Between the cold and the exhaustion that came with such rigorous exams it was all she could do to put on her oldest pair of jeans and a pair of faded, beat up old cowboy boots with knee-high socks for extra warmth. There was no telling what she was wearing under the parka, scarf, and hat. Her gloves had been a recent acquisition since they left her fingers open by way of a button on the back of her hand and also had the option being turned into a full mitten. Useful for days like today; days where she was carrying a large cup of something hot. Tonight was simply a hot chocolate (more for keeping her hands warm than anything else). A hand brushed her elbow and took her by surprise but her jump backward hadn't even phased the stranger that had touched her. He was tall, that much was for sure. Towering, in fact, with short cropped grey hair and lines deep in his face and around a pair of blue eyes that reminded her for a heartbeat of Daryl's. His clothes alone would have booked him as a tourist if his thick accent had not; flannel shirt over a wife beater and beat up old boots were simply not enough for this kind of weather.

"Maybe you can help me. Don't seem to be anybody else around to ask." The stranger was studying her, breaking her down into her component parts and Beth found herself backing up even farther. A sharp sense of alarm shot through her as he followed her step by step. His voice was higher than she had expected but every inch as scratchy and rough as the man looked. "I'm lookin' for a place called BU, I think." Everything about this man screamed _**predator**_, from the way he was watching her movements to the way he was trying to back her against a metal support beam and she wanted nothing more than to run as far away as she could. The unease in her heart grew and she found herself grateful for the layers that shielded her body from the man's gaze. Something about the way he spoke made her think that he knew exactly where he was trying to go and that lying to this particular man would not be the best maneuver. She stopped backing up and squared her shoulders and brought her gaze up to meet his in defiance.

"You want the next train that comes through. You wanna hop off at BU west." Technically it wasn't a lie; if he looked at the map (which she was sure he had) he would indeed find that she had directed him towards the right place. It was, however, two stops after she intended to get off the train herself and a good indication of whether or not he intended follow her. A few other people had filtered in and taken up spots a few steps away in an easy, broken line that managed to bolster her confidence just enough for her to take a breath and reach one hand into her pocket for her phone and pull it out, thumb tapping away to Amy.

_Creeper on the t. call the cavalry if I'm not back in 20_. The cavalry, of course, were Rick and Daryl. They had insinuated themselves into her life so seamlessly it was almost as if they had always been there, her protectors and her friends, people who would go through fire and flame to keep her safe.

"You live here? Pretty little thing like you all alone at night?" He could see her eyes widen, casually moving to try and make himself a hair less threatening by sliding his hands deep into his pockets and taking a step back. It didn't seem to work, she was just as on edge as before. "Your boyfriend lets you run around like this?"

A burning rage flooded surprisingly in her veins snapping her spine into iron, her voice into steel and she pushed forward, forcing him to step back again. "He doesn't _let_ me do anything. He isn't some backwards hick. You'd be lucky to be half the man he is." She was being rude and she knew it but it wasn't something that could be helped. Beth was over tired and seriously under caffeinated and this man, whoever he was, was making sweeping judgements he had no right to make. Daryl was the epitome of country and there was no denying that, but he wasn't backwards in the least. Daryl had the southern sun in his voice, the lazy rivers in his cadence, the thunder clashing against rock in his swagger and the ferocity of the summer storms in his spirit. Backwards, though, was not part of his description. He respected her too much for that and her own fire was part of her attraction. The man's eyes darkened and a snarl was tracing his lips. The train rumbled in and Beth turned on her heel and stalked towards the open doors. The man followed her in (no less than she had expected) and sat himself on the other end of the car with elbows on his knees. His hands were curled into a giant fist, one hand closed and the other wrapped around it hiding most of his face as he stared at her, studying her as though he had met with something unexpected. Beth stared angrily back at him until her stop arrived. Once her feet hit the pavement she whirled and thrust up one hand, middle finger extended, in a gesture that Daryl had helped her perfect.

A few days later brought her to Daryl's door. In her defense Beth was sleep deprived and hungry after once again missing lunch and dinner to study. This last call to Daryl, answered by Rick, had sent her over the edge in a bad way. He hadn't answered her calls or her text messages and the only thing Rick would tell her was that Daryl simply wasn't up to seeing or talking to her. The last few weeks had seen their relationship grow by leaps and bounds and just two days ago had he uttered the words of wanting them to see nobody else, to be 'exclusive'. A deep pit in her stomach had her convinced that he had changed his mind, succumbed to his fear that he was rotten and given up before he had even given them a chance. On the third straight day of radio silence she had stormed over to his building through the sleet coming down from the sky and pounded on the door of his apartment with a closed fist, voice raised to be heard through the wood.

"You come talk to me, Daryl, because I'm not going away! You don't get to just walk into my life and fucking **check out** on me in the middle of exams!" Her anger was starting to come out tinged with desperation and a neighbor down the hall cracked their door. "If you want out, fine. Be a man and tell me yourself. Don't have your roommate do your dirty work and dance around the subject!" The side of her fist thumped painfully loud on the wood again in rapid succession. "God damn it all, Daryl!" Her voice was starting to pitch up in frustration and hurt. "Tell me yourself!" Beth's emotions were getting the best of her but she couldn't help it, not this time. Part of her was deeply hurt; she'd made the mistake of approaching him and now she was getting the proverbial heartbreak. She raised her fist to slam on the door again when she heard the chain scrape against the door. That in itself made her pause, fist still raised. Rick and Daryl never used the chain. Why would they? Rick and Daryl were weapons unto themselves. Rick had his official police training in hand to hand and Daryl had been in more bar brawls than he could count. Her heart only sank further as the time between the latch, the deadbolt, and the crack of the door grew. The apartment was ominously dark through the gap; clearly he was going to let her open the door herself. Her fingers curled around the wood of the door and she paused. Something was wrong. This could be anybody; stories of murder and burglary flashed through her brain and for some reason an unbidden image of the man on the T flooded her thoughts.

"Daryl?" Beth's voice dropped hesitantly. "Is that you?" The door was pulled away from her hand and light from the hallway flooded the apartment and showed her the one thing she was not expecting to see. It was Daryl, alright. A broken, bruised, aching, and _beaten_ Daryl slowly cringing away from her. These bruises were days old and the strips holding his broken nose in place had traces of lint at the edges. His rugged face had turned into a palette of black and purple, finger bruises around his throat marked this attack as personal. He hadn't bothered with a shirt and the damage to the rest of his body was just as bad. Beth felt her hands covering her mouth in horror as she took in the patternless splotches of bruises that seemed to cover every inch of him.

"You shouldn't be here." His voice was cracked and dry and split like the skin of his lips.

"Daryl..." Her voice was breathy and sorrowful. Beth was trying to keep her face neutral but some of her heartache was crossing across her eyes, shadowing her face as she reached out for him. "I didn't know. You should've said something..." But he hadn't; partly because he knew she would have come. She stepped inside and flicked on the light, closing the door behind her and locking them in with sounds that seemed the echo across the emptiness of the space before her. She could see Rick sitting in the chair with the muted TV as the only light source in the room. All three firearms were sitting on the coffee table. The apartment, though...the apartment looked as though they were still cleaning up from a war. There was a stack of trashbags in the corner that were bulging with a variety of unknown shapes and contents. There were holes in the plaster on the wall, patches of a dark color staining the rug in several places. The coffee table was new; God only knew what happened to the last one. Daryl could see the horror on her face. His sweet, gentle, kind, Beth had likely never been exposed to violence on this level. His entire apartment reeked of a life and death struggle and it would be tainted for her forever. He had hoped to avoid all of this with her; it was why he hadn't answered her pleas for communication. When he had allowed Rick to finally answer her he had made the wrong decision. His plan had been to avoid her until she left, allow the five days of her break to bring him back to some semblance of functionality and deal with the problem of his brother. He reached the couch and sank down with a grimace.

_Daryl was working on a side project he had going on with a few of the guys from his master's program, an alternative and hard rock gig they had created to push themselves further on the musical spectrum. He had his headphones in and was sitting in front of his computer editing their tracks together; Daryl was by far the strongest editor of the group. As he saved the files he contemplated on sending it to Beth. He had written it about her, after all. There was no set writer among the group he was in now, it was all about equal collaboration. Whenever somebody had written a song they worked on it as a group to improve it and flesh it out. Overall he was proud of how this had come out but the time wasn't right for her to hear it, yet. This had a darker, edgier sound that was far from what they had created together. There wasn't even a touch of softness around it. They were both musicians and they both knew that music was the key to soul, the way to say things and speak to another person when you didn't know how else to say what you had to. Daryl took the headphones off with a sigh and smoothed his hand over his face in exhaustion when he heard the knock on the door. Daryl pushed back from the desk with a sigh and ambled barefoot to the door, calling out along the way. "You forget your keys again? Jesus Christ, Rick. Some day I ain't going to be home to let you in." He twisted the knob. The door swung open to reveal not Rick but one of the two men he had never wanted to see again. His brother._

_Merle and Daryl Dixon were cut from the same cloth, proof that it was the patterns and not the fabric that made the difference. They had run together for a while when Daryl was still young, still impressionable, still guilted into doing things against his conscience. With his brother at his side he had been a thief, an arsonist, an accomplice, a drunk, an addict. When their mother had burned down their home with her in it she had done more damage to her sons than their abusive father could have done in a year. Merle had always been like their old man; tough as a nail and equally rigid. Merle had been rough and tumble since he could walk, always putting a younger Daryl through his paces. It was through Merle that Daryl had first learned the value of pain (a lesson his father would continue). Now, as an adult, Daryl could see why Merle had acted out the way he did. He knew what happened when boys saw their father figures turn dark and abusive, it was Merle's way of escaping the hell that had been created for them. There was no doubt that Merle had his own feelings about his brother, feelings of fondness mixed in with a possessive pride, and they clouded Daryl's own emotions. All he had wanted as a child was to have his brother love him. There had been a time when Merle had stood up for him, taking his beatings, taught him things. He'd taught Daryl to hunt and track, how to shoot and how to fight. Then Merle had been involved in a robbery that had sent him to juvie when Daryl was eight. The next year was when Daryl had been lost in the woods, alone and terrified for nine whole days. He had used every scrap of knowledge that Merle had managed to impart in him and had managed to stay alive and alright until he found his way home. Something in juvie had changed his brother. He was cruel where he had been casual, there was hatred where anger had been before. Hatred at everything and everyone. Their lives had gone downhill from there. At ten, Daryl had been his first accomplice. He'd played the bait in a robbery, late at night after his old man had gotten through with him again. He'd gone crying into a gas station, talking about an accident, begging the woman behind the counter to come quick because his ma was hurt and he couldn't do anything about it. She hadn't even bothered to lock up behind her. When she and the bloody child reached the scene of the 'accident' she realized there hadn't been one at all and when she turned around the kid had melted into the woods. By the time she got back the entire register had been gone and the place had been trashed. That had been the start of a criminal career for young Daryl, one that had ended only when his brother had been given the option of 'military or jail' and chosen the military. He'd left three days after his brother, two days after his old man had blown his brains out with the shotgun on the wall. He had taken his mother's guitar and packed a trash bag with what little he owned, thrown it into the bed of his father's truck and put the whole damn state behind him. He hadn't seen Merle since. Warning flushed over his body and he tried to slam the door but Merle's booted foot got in the way. _

"_Go away, Merle." His voice was as tight as his body was, strung like an over tuned guitar string and ready to snap at the least amount of pressure. "I want nothing to do with you." Merle's giant hand caught the edge of the door and forced it back enough to allow his shoulder to shove it open farther, leaving Daryl stumbling._

"_You ain't gonna say hi, baby brother? It's been years. You didn't even call or send me a letter. Took me a while to track you down." There was a sneer a mile wide on his face, voice bitter and angry and he forced his way in the door, past his younger brother and into the apartment. Merle had always had the advantage of size, being taller, but the missing years had caught up with him. Daryl was nearly as tall as he was and equally as broad, all shoulder and muscle. He traipsed his way to the couch and crossed his feet on the table. "Nice little place you got here." Daryl was torn between anxiety and anger; how like his brother to waltz in like he never left. "Been watchin' you for days, Daryl. Met that pretty little thing of yours, even if she don't know it yet." He chuckled and watched his younger brother's fingers curl into fists. _

"_You don't talk to her. You don't look at her, speak to her, or even breathe in her direction." Now the fear was real and was reaching icy tendrils across his heart. He knew what his brother was capable of and he knew how simply tiny and defenseless Beth really was against somebody of his brother's caliber. The tenacity of her spirit couldn't protect her from a man like that. "Why are you here, Merle?" Merle's eyes, the same shade of blue as his own, stared him down from the couch. Daryl felt sick at his own stupidity. How could have he have believed that he could live out his life in peace? He had too much karmic debt for that._

"_Missed you, is all. What, I'm not allowed to come up for a visit?" The older Dixon hadn't missed the way Daryl had reacted. "Little bit even know about me? About you?" He was shrewdly hitting all of Daryl's markers, breaking into his defenses with words only. "Tell me, then. How'd a girl like her end up with you? And why's she thinkin' that you're a decent man? 'Cause that came up in conversation. Gotta say, I'm surprised you let a girl like that wander around after dark since you know what's in it and all..." Merle's arm branched over the couch, lazily invading his brother's space. "You ain't done a damn thing to correct her, have you?" He had the audacity to laugh with his head tilted back as though it was the funniest thing he'd heard in years. "Maybe I should have a talk with her. Enlighten her to your true nature. Tell me." He met his brother's eyes in a gleeful darkness. "You tapped that yet? She's a sweet one but she got some fire in her. Bet she's a killer in the sack." __Before he realized what he was doing Daryl had rushed towards his brother. He hadn't even realized that those were fighting words; he was acting on instinct. Instinct that stopped dead when his brother reached out with a boot and kicked him in the belly from where he was sitting on the couch, making a __tsking sound under his breath. "I taught you better than that, little brother. You wanna go? 'Cause we can. We can go all damn night if you want." Merle got slowly to his feet. "You're all I got left, little brother. This can go one of two ways, it's your choice. You know how either way is gonna work out. We used to have a grand ol' time together. Don't be fucking stupid."_

_Daryl looked up at him from the floor. It always came down to this. He always on the floor looking up towards his aggressor. Before he'd had nothing to fight for, no home to protect, no family to care about. The realization struck through his mind in a flash like lightning; he had a home. Rick and Beth were his family now, this little apartment had become his haven and a part of his identity. He would not be steamrolled over again. He was not weak or helpless and he wasn't afraid of his brother. Not anymore. Not when he had something to defend. Rick would be able to take care of himself but Beth? She was a steel magnolia for sure but her strength of character hadn't had an opportunity to transform into a physical form. Daryl knew better than most what Merle could do in the dark. It was that thought that launched him from the carpet into the most vicious fight he'd ever been involved in. This was no-holds barred, every dirty trick in the book kind of fighting. Anything (and everything) was turned into a weapon or a distraction. Dimly he was aware of crashing into the coffee table, the splintering of wood under his body as he rolled to avoid another kick. He felt himself pick up a bottle and miss Merle's head by half an inch, shattering the lower half on the wall before he threw the glass and the remaining contents toward his brother's eyes. Daryl landed punch after punch, kicking and throwing elbows wherever he could. There was that deep, dark rush that only came when he fought. Everything was hyper focused, his face twisted into an elated snarl. This was the side of him that Beth would never understand, the half-feral thing that was just a heartbeat away from ripping through his skin on the best of days. He had worked so hard to be a different and better person but under all of that was the same old delinquent, the one who loved the thrill of the fight and the rush of pain that came with it. He reveled in it, twisted it into fuel so that he could move faster and be stronger and throw more force behind behind his punches. But it wasn't enough. He was too out of practice, his determination to lead a better life had made him slow. Daryl could hear his blood pounding in his ears, feel it seeping out of cuts and flooding into bruises under his skin, draining him. This fight seemed to drag on forever and he was getting in one hit for every two that he was taking; he felt his nose give out and a wave of dizziness overtook him long enough for Merle to shove him against the wall, hand wrapped around Daryl's throat as he squeezed. _

"_You about done, baby brother? This ain't what I came here to do, you forced this." His voice was a snarl that seemed rougher coming out of his swollen jaw. "This isn't over." __There was a definable __click of a gun being cocked from the doorway; somebody had called the police. The unit that had answered was Rick and the rookie he was training. Daryl had never been so glad to see his roommate in his life._

"_I'd say it's over. Boston police. Get your hands where I can see them."_

"Look, it's not safe for you to be here." Daryl's spot on the couch was littered with bottles of advil and ice packs that needed to go back into the freezer. A loud clatter echoed as he swept them carelessly to the floor. "There's too much story to tell you right now." Eventually he would have to come clean, tell her exactly who he was and what he was capable of and he was convinced that would be the day she left him. For now Daryl would revel in her. The couch sank as she sat next to him, reaching out to touch him with a delicate certainty. He felt her fingers tracing along his face, her palm on his cheek, and he leaned desperately into her touch which seemed to be the only permission she needed. Daryl could feel her moving closer and he remained still to allow her to situate herself around him before pulling him the rest of the way into her arms. Despite the breaks and the bruises and the damage to his spirit he allowed himself to be pulled in. The fingers stroking lightly along his hair smoothed his soul and rekindled him in a way that Rick's stalwart defense couldn't. He decided to keep it short; he couldn't tell her everything, he just _couldn't_, but she had to know something. "M'brother's back in town." He was mumbling against the smooth pallor of her neck, curling into her side. "We had an argument."

"Do arguments usually end like this?" Beth's words were deceptively light and casual as she probed. "Anything I should be worried about?"

"Yeah." He closed his swollen and aching eyes and let her continue her ministrations; it seemed to soothe both of them as well as giving her a chance to assess his injuries. "Rick arrested him but he picked the cuffs and split. Damn rookie hadn't closed the door right and he jetted. He knows who you are. Said he ran into you." It clicked.

"Tall? Grey hair? Eyes same color as yours and an accent thicker than molasses? Doesn't know how to shave? Kind of guy that makes you wanna cross the street at night?" Her eyes narrowed as her lips tightened in anger. "I ran into him, alright. On the T a few days ago." There was a wince from Daryl that carried across his entire body. "Look, I'm only here for a few more days. I fly out on Tuesday. And then I'm gone till the next Monday. It'll be fine. Everything is going to be fine." There was an ache in her heart but that couldn't be solved. Going home was the last thing she wanted; her mother was sick and there was no indication of what it was only that it was getting worse and if Maggie was correct it looked like her father was close to drinking again. It was what she had been so desperate to speak to Daryl about to begin with; Amy was a lucky kid. She hadn't had to face this sort of thing before and she just didn't understand. Beth was scared and lonely and needed reassurance so badly but now...now she needed to be strong for him. "I won't do anything stupid, I promise. You don't need to worry about me, okay? I need to study anyway." It was a sign of his condition that he didn't argue or at have anything else to say, he simply nodded and was content to let himself be held. He wasn't prepared for the way his spirits lifted when she placed a soft, chaste kiss on his lips. "I'm also not going anywhere, so please don't ask me to. I think your neighbors are pissed at me as it is." Beth felt his lips twitch into a smile against her cheek.

"I knew you had a set of lungs, blondie, but I had no idea how damn stubborn you are."

"You don't have a clue, Daryl. Trust me. It's all gonna be okay until I get back, and we'll deal with everything then."

Beth was miserable. She missed school, she missed Daryl, she missed her friends and her work. It was wonderful to be home, to be around Maggie, to get to know Glenn better but it was all wrong. The house was hushed and painfully quiet and her father rarely left her mother's side. Her mother, vibrant and strong and determined, was reduced to lying in bed with the lights off suffering seizure after seizure. Beth had taken to spending more than her fair share of time out on the porch with her guitar and Daryl's face on the screen of her tablet that she set up on the porch railing. In a way it was luck that her father was preoccupied; he would have wanted to talk to Daryl and seen the bruises and forbidden them from interacting which would have broken his daughter's heart. Maggie had been warned during a long conversation they had in the hayloft after setting up lunch in there like they used to when they were young, escaping the quiet of the house in the process.

"You sure you're safe there? This Merle guy sounds like bad news." Maggie was digging into her food with enthusiasm while Beth picked at hers forlornly. "I know you can take care of yourself and all, Beth, but I don't think I could take it if anything happened to you. This guy seriously creeps me out." The younger of the Greene sisters was pushing potato salad across her plate. Food in the Greene household was cold these days, you ate when you were hungry and occasionally somebody would make something and stick it in the fridge. They weren't even going to do a thanksgiving dinner at all. Her father was lost in the throes of her mother's illness.

"I think so, Mags." The blonde glanced up. "I really don't think Daryl would let anything happen to me. Don't think Rick would, either. He's a cop and all." Maggie sighed.

"I know but they can't be with you all the time. The guy can pick handcuffs behind his back, breaking into a dorm would be a piece of cake."

"Assuming he knew where I lived." Beth countered but her argument was feeble, even to her own ears.

"Better safe than sorry."

The days started to stretch and Daryl could see over the screen and hear through her voice that something was going on, but every time he asked her about it she put on a fake smile and changed the subject. Part of him was more than a little angry; did she think him incompetent? Useless? Did she really think that he couldn't handle any bad news or help her in any way? And then he would get exhausted just from heating up something for dinner and the depression came sweeping through. He **was** useless. He was still stiff and tired easily, he slept through the day when he wasn't talking to Beth. Thankfully he hadn't had to work. The way she avoided the subject, though, bothered him. It was so unlike her. Beth would tell him if he fucked up, she'd be in his face and confrontational. If it was a joy she would tell him. So what was so dark, so bad, that she couldn't even tell him? It was after the third straight day of silence and solemn strumming that the idea came to him. The song he had finished recording before hurricane Merle blew through his house and destroyed almost everything he had tried so hard to build. If nothing else he could reassure her about how he felt. It was with that in mind that he had sent the email with the .mp4 attachment right after they'd gotten off the phone for her to have dinner with her sister. Beth usually checked her email before bed so he waited by the computer for his Skype to start chiming.

Beth had already settled in for the night in her bed and was doing a last minute check before she went to sleep. Her hair was piled on top of her head in a messy bun, and she was sleeping in her customary shorts and a tank top. Right before she was about to hit the red dot to exit out of her email a new one caught her eye. From Daryl. Why would Daryl send her an email with an attachment? She clicked on it. There was no message. There was, rather, a file named 'you are the 4'. That was a music file. One of her eyebrows raised up as she reached over to her bedside table for her headphones, plugging them in to the jack and sliding them into her ears as she downloaded the file into her iTunes. Then her eyes widened. Heavy guitar, heavy drums, heavy everything.

_Oh my_.

That was Daryl, alright, darker than she had ever heard him. But the styles were all different. Not wrong, though, it was too good to be considered wrong. He had said that he was mostly country and she hadn't had a chance to think about it until now. Mostly wasn't all. It turned out that her redneck had a talent for rock as well. She buried her face in her hands and tried not to cry as the lyrics filtered through her ears and into her brain. Somehow Daryl knew exactly what she needed. She needed to feel loved and cared for, supported and held upright and even though she hadn't told him why and had done her best to hide it from him, he had known. And if she were to be honest with herself...heavy was what she needed.

_Stood at the edge of the valley__  
__Looked at the ground below__  
__Oh I was surrounded__  
__There's nowhere left to go___

_I heard the wind chime beneath my feet__  
__I felt the earth shake inside me__  
__I run forever but I won't get far__  
__Cause if I don't have you I will starve___

_There's a wolf in my heart__  
__There's a wolf in my heart, for you_

___There's a wolf in my heart__  
__There's a wolf in my heart, for you__  
__There's a wolf in my heart__  
__There's a wolf in my heart, for you__  
__For you, for you___

_Oh was it cold desperation__  
__That let fire go out__  
__Oh was it cold desperation__  
__Cause I let it burn for miles___

_I am an animal for what I need__  
__You are the wilderness inside me__  
__I run forever but I won't get far__  
__Cause if I don't have you I will starve_

_There's a wolf in my heart  
There's a wolf in my heart, for you_

_There's a wolf in my heart  
There's a wolf in my heart, for you_

_There's a wolf in my heart  
There's a wolf in my heart, for you_

_for you, for you___

_You are the wilderness__  
__You are the wilderness__  
__You are the wilderness__  
__You are the, You are the one__  
__You are the one_

He was beginning to think she hadn't gotten the damn thing after all. His phone had been silent and there was no sign of her on Skype. Daryl was beginning to lose hope and was just about ready to close his laptop for night when the sound of somebody signing on stopped his hand and his heartbeat picked up. This was a new step for them. One could argue that she had made her debut at the mic night they had done but theoretically that could have been directed at anyone. They both knew better (hell, even Rick had known better) but the potential was there. This was infinitely more direct; there was no question it was about her and for her. Then the sound of Skype calling had him reaching over to accept the video call. What he found was alarming. Beth was on the end with her eyes red and sniffling. His heart sank.

"Oh...I didn't mean to make you cry, honest..." That started a new round of tears that left him dumbstruck with concern all over his face. "Beth...Beth you gotta talk to me. What's going on? Are you okay?" It dragged out. Jesus, how long could she cry? And he was sitting at the other end of the seaboard pleading with her. "Don't cry. Please don't cry, whatever I did...I'm sorry...I didn't mean it..." It only made her cry harder. Eventually he stopped asking if she was alright, asking what he did, sitting in silence and trying to keep his misery from showing across his face. Rick poked his head in with a 'what the fuck' gesture, Daryl just shrugged with his eyes wide. Eventually she calmed down.

"I'm sorry, Daryl. I didn't..." She hadn't meant to break down like that but there was so much on her shoulders that she didn't even know what to do anymore. "Hang on..." She vanished from his screen and he could hear her soft footsteps across her room before everything moved. She was likely carrying him outside and for a while all he could see was the front of her sweater. Ordinary Daryl wouldn't have minded such a view and even teased her about it but something about tonight was different. He heard the clatter of the porch door behind him and he was set on the railing across from her favorite chair. "My mom's sick, Daryl. She's really sick." He could read the heartache in her face. This must have been what was bothering her the whole time; he cursed himself for not demanding answers of her earlier, she shouldn't have had to bear this burden alone. "They don't even know what's wrong with her." Beth scrubbed at her eyes and curled up on herself. "They can't even tell us if she's going to get better. The hospital sent her home and Daddy won't put her in hospice. They said they didn't know what else to do. I'm afraid she's gonna die, Daryl. I don't know what to do." His heart broke into a thousand pieces and he sank his head into his hands and ran them through his hair. If he could have done anything to spare her this pain he would have; Daryl had lost his mother at a tender age and it had done a number on him. On one hand she'd had more time with her mom than he had had with his but tact prevented him from saying it.

"Then you tell her you love her. And you tell her every day you can. Then you come back to me on Monday and we take it one step at a time." Silence fell between them and he could see the faint outline of her breath in the night. Sometimes just being there was enough. But not tonight. Tonight it just wasn't enough. He had come so close to losing her entirely and the threat of his brother was still fresh in his mind. Life was too damn short for any of this to matter; he was struck by the realization that he was falling in love with her. For better or for worse Beth Greene had his heart. "Together, okay?" Beth looked at him through the screen and nodded.

"Together."


End file.
